Incarnating The Kingdom Of God

By Samuel M. Buick

NOTE: This happened during my tenure in the Vineyard Movement in Canada.  I was involved in traditional church leadership at the time. In 1999 I left the movement and embraced relational community that gathers from house to house.  This testimony is part of the journey to where I am now in the Lord and in my understanding of how the body gathers and functions.  SMB (6 June, 2004).

In October 1997, I received a word through Heather Jackson. The Jacksons are on the itinerrant ministry staff of the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship. Peter and Heather had come to the Kitchener Vineyard to speak and minister during anniversary meetings. During the ministry time Heather directed a word to me that the Lord was pleased with me and that my time was short until I would be ready for what the Lord has for me. She indicated that I was like a glove being pulled inside out. Little did I know the implications of such a word and how the Lord brings it to pass.

Complacency taken root becomes a thorny briar to ensnare Christians into a false sense of security. However beautiful a rose may be, they remain within briars, and briars are most difficult obstacles to overcome in pruning rose bushes. Such an image illustrates my faith journey. I had been on quite a spiritual roller coaster through much of 1997, and I felt quite secure and comfortable in my walk with my Lord Jesus. While there were moments of intense intimacy, there were also moments of unparalleled stress in the workplace, as well as in some relationships, and in the approaching anniversary of my daughter's death. Not wanting to deal with the strain, or the pain, I became mechanical and pragmatic in my relationship with the Lord, not noticing how serious this was to my overall well being.

My false sense of security was shattered as my frail human frame smashed into an oak tree on a sunny afternoon in late December (12/28/97). My body lay crumpled on the slope of the hill as the toboggan continued to the bottom. While I had a sense of peace and well being, that I was in the hands of the Most High, and safe and secure, I knew that I had suffered a few broken pieces to this body of mine. The diagnosis at the hospital was a compressed L4 and L5 fracture (broken back), broken ulna, and smashed elbow. I knew in how bad a shape I was in when the doctor said, "We'll try to put Humpty back together again!"

While the surgery to my arm and elbow, a Jewitt brace for my back and subsequent physio therapy has done much to bring healing to my body, it has been the prayers of God's people that has accelerated the healing process. Physically the Lord touched my body in three distinct ways. During the first week in the hospital, a friend of mine went to the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship (TACF) and stood in my place in the prayer line. That night I lay worshipping the Lord with worship tapes and my walkman. I felt a strange sensation go up my right arm and to my shoulder and down my spine and uncontrollable streams of tears flowed down my cheeks as the Lord touched my body. I had a large bump in the middle of my back from the impact of my body against the tree. It was quite visible and the pain was minimal. However, I was concerned about my back and my friend knew this and asked for prayer specifically for my back. The next day, my wife Lori came to powder and massage my back, and as I turned to my side, she saw that the swelling and all trace of the bump had disappeared. I wept in gratitude to the Lord for this miracle.

The second occurrence was the day I was going home, sixteen days after the accident. The cast on my arm was removed, and upon examination, the arm and elbow had completely healed. I had the cast on two weeks instead of the twelve weeks recommended by the surgical team! This again was due to the prayers of friends who interceded for my needs.

The other incident occurred a few weeks after I came home. In early February, Lori was awakened from her sleep and went downstairs and while worshipping the Lord, felt impressed in her spirit that she too ought to go to the TACF and stand there for me concerning a complete healing for my back. At this time the surgeons were unsure as to whether I would need surgery to stabilize the L4/L5 fracture. I had been wearing the Jewitt brace for three weeks, and in a few days Lori knew I would be having x-rays and another examination. There was no sensation of anything happening the night Lori went to the TACF, for we were not ruled by feelings or manifestations, but rely on God's promises and His word. Tuesday came, and upon examining the x-rays, the surgeon was ecstatic, and asked me to begin weaning off the brace! All this after simply three weeks of wearing a brace that I was supposed to wear for six months!

While this may cause wonder and marvel, the work of God in my heart continues to be far more significant than the physical healing, as it reveals the nature of incarnating the kingdom of God in our hearts. As I lay on my back, restricted physically, I realized that I was restricted spiritually and could not hide from my pain and I certainly could not hide from the Lord. It became obvious that there was warfare going on for my mind. I did not need the devil to condemn me as I did a good enough job without him! I realized as I lay there that I had entrenched some stinking thinking, straying from a grace and mercy paradigm to one of phariseeism cloaked in legalism and judgementalism. The physical pain was tolerable compared to the agony in my soul as I realized what I had done to my relationship with the Lord which in turn affected my other relationships. I had "worshipped God with my lips, while my heart was far from Him" (Matt. 15:8-9).

It is interesting that when Lori went to TACF to stand there for my healing, she came home with a booklet on forgiveness by John Arnott. I read it through one early morning, did a lot of groaning, wrestling, and weeping and then I repented and was washed clean by the Spirit of God...peace, rest, and a call to public confession. When the physio therapist came to see me, we had an opportunity to share with her what the Lord had done. We were able to minister to her and pray with her. Afterward Lori had a word of knowledge. She believed that the constant pealing of skin on my right hand, which tormented me, was a 'hand of phariseeism' upon me. I had since the accident had a constant pealing of the skin on my right hand. The doctor did not know what it was from and said that maybe over time it would go away. Lori prayed for me and I agreed with her and repented before the Lord. A day later I realized my skin was no longer pealing. Not only had the Lord answered Lori's prayer, but through the prophetic witness, the Lord had revealed my inner heart, and how it was connected with an attitude of repentance.

The weeping prophet, Jeremiah, records the words of Jehovah, "Isn't my message like a fire?" says the Lord. "Isn't it like a hammer that smashes a rock?" (Jer. 23:29). Fire consumes that which is impure, and purifies precious metal. Our lives are like precious metal that needs to be purged of impurities, and it is through adversity and trial that those impurities are consumed by the Fire of God, in which the Spirit of God cleanses and sanctifies areas of our lives that have previously been strongholds of the enemy. The Word of God smashes our stony hearts as sure as the oak tree smashed my body. Ezekiel prophesied,

"I will give them a desire to respect me completely, and I will put inside them a new way of thinking. I will take out the stubborn heart of stone from their bodies, and I will give them an obedient heart of flesh. Then they will live by my rules and obey my laws and keep them. They will be my people, and I will be their God." (Ezek. 11:19-20).

Upon deeper reflection and prayer, my favourite portion of Scripture literally became incarnated in me. It became a part of me, my thinking, my being, my essence. I knew that in it was the core of my relationship with the Lord, as well as the central truths of the Gospel. The weeping prophet was also the prophet of promise and joy! Jeremiah recorded a prophecy, which was for the people of Judah that was fulfilled after the exile. But the spiritual principles found therein have significance for all Christians. He states:

"I say this because I know what I am planning for you," says the Lord. 'I have good plans for you, not plans to hurt you. I will give you hope and a good future. Then you will call my name. You will come to me and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will search for me. And when you search for me with all your heart, you will find me! I will let you find me,' says the Lord. 'And I will bring you back from your captivity" (Jer. 29:11-14a).

I came to a greater understanding of God's sovereignty and providence. God's plans include what I would consider "bad" things. My salvation is not a guarantee against trials, tribulations and afflictions, but rather it is the seal of God's promise to be with me in the midst of all that I consider evil. The evil one seeks my destruction (my collision with an oak tree), yet there is nothing he can do to me outside of the will of God. He is simply a sergeant major in God's army. He, in his attacks against me is in actuality being a means of grace in my life. His attacks draw me closer to the Lord, and the Lord sanctifies me and renews me, giving me a deeper and richer relationship with Him and others in the kingdom of God. While the devil was attempting to expand his kingdom of darkness through my affliction, the Lord was extending His kingdom in my heart, building it precept upon precept, replacing judgement with mercy, legalism with grace.

My life had been nurtured in God's kingdom. But as in all living organisms, without the proper balance of nurture, nutrition, and shelter, imbalance can occur. I began over a brief time to live a dichotomy between what was "my turf" and what was "God's space." The crisis was one of lordship. The struggle within was a tug of war between divided loyalties. My previous relationship with the Lord Jesus, and intimacy with the Holy Spirit was replaced with "religion," my attempt to appease God and get Him off my back. The words of Jeremiah became prophetic in that God had to make me go into "exile and captivity" in order to shake me out of my complacency. It is noteworthy that God, even in bringing discipline, does so with a promise of blessing. I knew that God's desire was to restore me and bless me, and that whatever discomfort I had to face, I could do so with the assurance that He was with me.

The dark places of the soul can overtake me when I fail to turn to the Lord in the midst of that darkness. All of my previous adversities and afflictions; from the rejection of my father, self defeating perfectionism, past failures in various enterprises, the death of loved ones, and the endless trail of broken relationships, were in actuality a series of "exiles and captivities," places where God could invade and establish His kingdom in my life, taking me from alienation to intimacy and fullness of life. Unfortunately, I had blinded myself from seeing these tribulations as opportunities for grace, and over the long haul they had become a burden rather than a path to renewal and blessing.

Symbolically that tree is an image of redemption, just as is the ark of Noah and the cross of Jesus. That tree which I originally had cursed and desired to chop down, is now a precious reminder of God's love, grace and mercy. I would rather tie a yellow ribbon `round the old oak tree, than lay an axe against its trunk. Where the evil one had intended evil and harm and my destruction, God intended to bring about goodness.

It is one thing to abstractly apprehend biblical knowledge of the kingdom of God, and quite another to incarnate that truth into one's core of being. God's kingdom is being established in my life with each stronghold taken from the enemy, the kingdom extending deeper in relationship with Jesus and other people. Relationships are not devoid of a context. That context is wrought with life experiences, the good, the bad, the ugly. It is here that God brings his plans to fruition. Jeremiah (29:11) reveals that God's plans are for welfare, not for calamity, to give us a future and a hope. I believe that hopelessness in my life has often been caused by a faulty worldview, a disjointed theology, and expressed through a self-centred ideology.

My worldview I always considered to be biblical, but in this time of reflection, I discovered that even though it was scriptural, pragmatically I had been an atheist. Daily I would deny by my actions what I believed. I was consistently inconsistent. The result being an uneasiness of spirit and an aloofness with God and people in my life.

My theology, of which I was proud, had become disjointed from its intended purpose. Theology being the study of God through the crucible of experience had been blunted through a stifled relationship, thereby reducing it to mere theological speculation and reflection. It was distancing God from "real life" interaction, waxing me cold, rendering me mechanical, methodical, enthroning judgement over and against mercy.

This led to my being "captive" to my own self-centred ideology. God reduced to philosophical presuppositions, stifling and choking out the ebb and flow of the Spirit (which incarnates God's truth in our hearts) left me in a life-less existence. Over even a short time the hardening of the heart, unwilling to acknowledge the pain, the hurts, through which God intended to bring about good, overtook my aspirations with hopelessness and despair.

God's promise to Jeremiah was incarnated into my spirit as I lay in hospital. The Lord promised to listen to me when I called His name. Each day as I drew near, the Lord renewed me through His Word. As I worshipped Him in stillness and quietness, I heard the whisper of His voice. He soothed my aching pain in my soul, He caressed me as I laid in His bosom. Gently He wrote His Word upon my heart of flesh. He answered the prayers of God's people who had interceded for me, and poured His healing balm upon my broken body, and He restored my soul.

When I turned to Him and sought Him, He revealed himself in order to be found by me. This He did for me, to bring me from "captivity," from alienation, from self-centred existence, to incarnate His kingdom of love and intimacy in me, giving me purpose, meaning and life abundantly. How precious life is, that even in the darkness of the soul, in the "shadowlands," God's light in me cannot be extinguished, for He shelters me in times of storm.

When complacency raises it's head, when affliction attempts to destroy and tear down, when tribulations next try to overtake God's kingdom in me, I will look with quiet confidence and expectation for the Rose in the midst of the briar, and whisper, "Yes, Lord?"

POSTSCRIPT: Six years later, I keep learning more and more, and keep seeing that in all my afflictions, and the more the refining, the more of Jesus is transformed in me, and more and more of His Kingdom is planted and blooms in me!  My understanding of who Jesus is, what the Kingdom is, and what the Body is keeps growing as I grow in Christ and overcome my circumstances and challenges.